We've all heard of those grand Chinese banquets with innumerable courses including delicacies like sea slugs and bird's nests, but at Madrid Fusion this year I caught a glimpse of the future. Goods from China dominate our shops but my suspicion is that Chinese food is going to take over our restaurant menus - and I don't mean chop suey and egg fried rice.

Typically on the table at this time of year would be dumplings for luck, a rich roast Peking Duck, the clean flavor of steamed whole Sea Bass with bright lemongrass notes, something sweet of course and the beautiful orange glow and sharp bite of mounds of clementines.

Chinese New Year is much more important to Chinese people than simply the start of a New Year. Indeed, CNY in China extends far beyond the street celebrations and stage performances that we are exposed to in the UK.

When the Huffington Post asked me, a 37-year-old married father of two, if I wanted to enter a cooking competition to win a trip to Hong Kong with a 25-year-old girl I'd never met, it was a real no-brainer. I'm confident that in no way would my wife go ballistic if I jogged off to the other side of the world leaving her with two pre-school kids to look after, so I signed up on the spot.

I first visited China over 30 years ago when it was just opening up to Westerners. Rather than do the whole country by train, as most travellers seemed to do, I decided to explore the West, specifically Sichuan and Yunnan.

The growing influence of China has been a hot topic of discussion for several years now, as the economic powerhouse of the East has emerged as a legitimate contender to the USA's supremacy as the world's most powerful nation.

I can happily eat my own body weight in dim sum but usually they're something I'd go to a restaurant for. Then I made a pleasant but inauthentic Peking Duck (the recipe search continues) and found myself with some leftovers. The resulting spring rolls were a bit 'meh' but the dumplings were delicious.

Succulent, moist, well balanced, delicious, inspiring. These are words I would not use to describe a KFC 3 piece meal deal for £4.99. Whereas soggy, limp, greasy, salty, tragic, granular, are all just words. Anyway, what am I going to do with all this delectable goodness?

Everything has a moment, a time where it's everywhere, and fashionable, and all anyone seems to want. Right now London is all about what my friend Charlotte calls 'man food'- big, hearty, simple dishes.

In a city where authenticity and taste reign supreme, it's not unusual to see a Porsche or a new Maserati parked up outside an anonymous hole-in-the-wall diner known for serving the best Mao Shi Hong Shao Rou (Chairman Mao's favourite braised pork dish) in town.

Why is it, that upon seeing a buffet, we completely disregard our life's worth of known food pairings and think that it is absolutely acceptable to mix and match without any consideration or consequence?